Life is not all happiness, triumph or good things. Life is a mix of good and bad, sadness and happiness, victory and defeat. No man has ever lived on this earth without experiencing the ups and downs of life. Regardless of the circumstances, as human beings, we are made to feel these different emotions. This in fact separates us from all the other forms of life on earth. Humans have emotions. Others don’t.

One such emotion which is kind of difficult to handle is grief. People feel this as a natural reaction to losing a loved one. Losing people we love and care about suddenly and unexpectedly bring forth this unpleasant feeling.

People grieve over terrible and unimaginable situations like death of a pet, loss of a job, loss of lives and properties to disasters and natural calamities (fire, earthquake, flood, tsunami, terrorist acts, etc.). In situations like these, no amount of emotional and psychological strength could prepare us to accept the circumstances as calmly as we could. Even the strongest of man is not free from this overwhelming emotion.

HOW DO WE HANDLE GRIEF?

Just very recently I came across a story about an old lady whose husband is suffering from brain cancer. For some reasons the husband got lost one day. The old lady took to the streets asking around if anybody had seen her husband. She even stuck a paper with her husband’s photo on it, on her dress as she walked around. It took her over a week until some good-hearted people who saw her picture in the news contacted her to inform that her husband has been located. The old lady couldn’t be happier when she finally reunited with her husband. But the happiness was short lived because a couple of days later her husband was brought to the hospital and not long after succumbed to cancer.

The old lady’s grief was just too much that a few weeks after her husband’s death, she fell ill and did not recover. She joined her husband soon enough.

This story gets you to think about the reality of losing a loved one and how such loss triggers one’s coping mechanism on grief. Apparently the old lady was not able to cope with grief over losing her husband and yielded in the overwhelming sadness she felt.

This could happen to anyone especially those with very low emotional stability. Grief manifests in so many different levels and degree. Some people will manage to get over it, some will not recover. No one knows for sure how long you can endure the pain and sadness. But some helpful ways to cope up will be worth a try.

• Acceptance – a person’s acceptance of the situation he or she is into will help a lot in overcoming grief. Any form of denial will just aggravate and bottle up the emotions felt over losing someone or something. The faster the person accepts the situation the faster he/she will feel better
• Grieve – people sometimes see grieving as a weakness that they deny themselves the chance to feel grief and sadness. Allow yourself to feel the emotion that naturally goes with any situation and you will realize that the emotions improve over time.
• Time – it heals all wounds. Give yourself time and space to drown in sadness. This is okay but only for a short period. A prolonged period of grieving could mean more serious emotional problem. If this happens, you should seek professional help to be able to handle your grief better.

As the degree of grief varies from one person to another depending on the causes of such grief everyone must believe that you will wake up one day feeling a whole lot better.

Kathleen, my third year high school niece has swimming class in school. Since her early years in school, swimming has always been included in her weekly schedule. That’s when she started to love swimming so much. She grabs every chance she gets to dip into the pool and enjoy every minute of it.

Not until that one morning when they were asked to compete in groups during swimming class. Kathleen’s mom who is a doctor received a call from the school nurse asking her to pick up her daughter right away as she (Kathleen) was very scared due to a minor accident that happened in swimming class. That kind of call will definitely cause someone to speed away and find out what happened. Her mom first thought that she might have had eye infections as she recently had an eye surgery.

It turned out that Kathleen almost drowned as she tried to complete the hurdle in the pool. She said she was fine in the beginning but during the last lap she felt a sudden surge of fear creeping through her when it was her turn to swim. She felt herself froze and could not move her legs and arms. She gasped for air and pushed her last ounce of strength to get to the surface. Luckily, she managed to climbed out of the pool before she felt weak again,

PANIC ATTACK

After the incident, we found out that Kathleen got so anxious during the last lap because she was the last member in the team and if she failed to finish the lap, her team would lose. That thought caused tightness in her chest and had breathing problems even before she got down the pool. Her mom explained she experienced panic attack which caused her brain to send signals to her body to become weak. Thus, she thought she was almost fainting when she hit the water.

The good thing is, hers was a mild panic attack and did not cause her to fear water or swimming after the incident. For other people, the onset of such panic attack would have triggered the emergence of a phobia.

Phobia is a disorder manifesting extreme or severe fear of something. It could be anything from cat, dog, water, heights, elevator, crowd, etc. Once you feel this unreasonable and inexplicable fear or anxiety, you totally lose control to instruct your brain to treat the feeling as normal fear – it will attack but then it will also pass just as quickly as it came.

On the other hand, fear for phobic persons can badly affect not just the physical condition but more so one’s emotional and psychological as well. Phobia can be overwhelmingly devastating. No matter what the fear triggers are (animals, conditions, place, etc.) one needs to recognize it in order to fight and overcome it.

HOW TO OVERCOME FEAR / PHOBIA

When the fear trigger is identified, one can start conditioning the mind to control the fear being felt. It wouldn’t be easy of course, but once your mind is properly set to fighting the fear, the rest would come easy.

For Kathleen, the immediate remedy her mom gave her was to bring her to a swimming pool a few days after the incident and asked her to swim again. She hesitated at first but then got over the fear and took a dip. She faced her fear and triumphed over it.

But for some who have severe cases of phobia, facing the fear will not be easy. A phobic person will squirm on the idea of seeing a snake for example and it would take a lot of prodding or encouragement from people around her before she could actually look at the snake.

This exercise might not work, however, to extremely phobic people. They would need a more complex therapy, relaxation exercises and skills recommended by professional therapists. The important thing is to recognize and accept the fear and be ready to fight it in order to get back to close to a normal life.

A friend of mine shares the story about her 14 year old son Patrick. He was busy with filing the paperwork for a divorce. He is a fine young boy with an infectious smile. He is active and bustling, running around their home every time I visit them. He is so full of energy and life!

But everything suddenly changed one afternoon when he came from school feeling as he said, “odd”. Thinking that it was just one of his normal mood swings, my friend did not bother much. She brushed the worries away and went with her normal routine. The week passed the usual way. Patrick’s gloomy aura did not seem disturbing at that time.

My friend started to get worried when her son refused to go to school the following week making up ordinary excuses like they have no teacher or that there are activities in school and he did not have to be there, etc. At first, my friend believed her son. But when the excuses became highly suspicious, my friend decided to check with school authorities. And she was so shocked to discover that her son had not been attending his classes for 2 weeks and she did not understand that because Patrick only stayed home for 2-3 days, not 2 weeks!

And that’s how my friend got to know ‘D’ or depression. It was a painful experience. She never suspected Patrick to be afflicted with this disorder. No mother would want her child to go through this very unfamiliar and inexplicable sadness.

So how exactly do we figure out if depression has set in? Well, the first step is to try to get to know everything about the illness or disorder. Recalling what my friend told me about Patrick’s behavior and comparing them with the information I gathered I came up with the simplified, easy-to-understand list of ’watch-out for’ behavior or actions from anyone you know or suspect to be afflicted with depression.

TELL-TALE and GIVE-AWAY SIGNS and SYMPTOMS

What my friend failed to notice or observe is the big difference between ‘normal unhappiness’ and unusual melancholy. Patrick seemed lonely and unhappy for days and my friend thought it was normal behavior.

If we read articles about depression, we would know that the prolonged loneliness displayed by Patrick is the first sign of depression. He never got out of his sadness. My friend’s failure to detect this first sign led to more serious problems for Patrick. He started doing things uncontrollably like hurting himself when he gets angry or emotional. He even burned his arms with lighted cigarettes. It became hard for him to cope with school work and he just wanted to stay home all the time. He became withdrawn and isolated. He got easily irritated and agitated that my friend found him difficult to deal with. With all these happening to Patrick, my friend finally admitted to herself that her son needs professional help. There is nothing more she can do to help Patrick.

HELPFUL WAYS TO OVERCOME DEPRESSION

One of the painful lessons my friend about this unpleasant situation is the power of acceptance. One she decided to accept the condition of her son, it became easier for her to do what was necessary to help Patrick. She never wanted for her son to suffer like that. And she couldn’t blame anyone for that either. Soon enough she came to understand that the best support her son needs is from his family. And that she owes to her son.

Apart from the professional therapy and medication her son had to undergo, my friend recognizes and accepts her role in all these. She should be strong for Patrick. Her son should all the more feel loved and accepted despite the affliction. My friend even learned some calming exercises or relaxation activities which she uses every time Patrick shows signs of agitation.

Although the progress is slow, my friend couldn’t be happier with the behavioral improvement manifested by Patrick after months of therapy and medication. Although she did not recognize the disorder right away, she is happy just the same because Patrick’s chances of improving and eventually getting cured are high. And she couldn’t ask for more at this time. Better yet, he is about to go for a cruise vacation; hopefully to resolve issues with his wife.

Any form of abuse, be it emotional, physical, mental, verbal, etc. has demoralizing and harmful effects on the person being subjected to such abuse. It’s upsetting and distressing and has long-term negative impact on a person’s perception of his/her whole being and self worth.

Some say physical abuse is a lot better than emotional abuse because the bruises or marks on the body will fade in time but emotional abuse leaves a scar on one’s self value that is difficult to heal and alter.

Emotional abuse takes many forms. It could be repeated insults or ridicule, intimidating remarks, constant criticisms and humiliation and condescending comments. The abuse is strong enough to make the abused person believed what the abuser is telling him/her, losing his/her rational sensibility to think otherwise. The overpowering effect of emotional abuse can render a person agreeing to the abuser’s accusations and declarations. An emotionally-abused person often feels rejected, dejected and unloved. And this emotional condition can last a lifetime if not acted upon.

HOW TO COPE AND OVERCOME EMOTIONAL ABUSE

We see it all the time on reality TV programs – a weak wife emotionally-abused by an alcoholic husband, a passive husband abused by a strong-willed wife. The fact is, emotional abuse is everywhere and it does not pick who the abuser and abused is. More often than not, the abuser succeeds in ruining and crushing the confidence of the abused by repeated verbal attacks. And the abused unwillingly accepts these emotional assaults. The abused is rendered powerless by the abuser and it makes complete sense that the cycle never ends for both the abuser and the abused.

Professional psychologists and psychiatrists recommend some steps found to be helpful in overcoming emotional abuse in its early stage.

• The first important step is for the abused to care about herself physically. If you treat yourself well and it manifests physically, your mind will resist any form of abuse. Keeping yourself fit gives you the confidence and self-affirmation. If you feel good about yourself you will not let anyone destroy and ruin that. A regular exercise program will definitely help you boost your self-confidence.
• Support group always provide the emotional support needed by the abused. Your support group will give you the feeling of being loved, wanted and appreciated. It keeps you from isolating yourself and not letting anyone know what is happening to you. It’s bad enough that you are abused but worst if no one knows about it but you and your abuser.
• Learn different ways of releasing anger, frustration and emotional distress. It could be by recalling instances of abuse and writing them on a journal. At the same time, you should write down the emotions that go with each abusive incident. Be honest enough to express your true feelings even if it makes you think little of yourself. This way, you are able to get all the emotions out of your head enabling you to think better and eventually recognize the abuse and realize that it should come to an end.
• The abuser always manages to get the abused feel guilty just about anything. The abused should switch this emotion off. There is nothing to be guilty about expressing your thoughts or opinion on anything. It is everyone’s inherent right and no one should tell you that you cannot voice out your thoughts.
• Be emotionally strong and don’t allow your abuser to break you inside. You should be able to tell yourself that there is a limit to your willingness to accept the emotional abuse. Convince yourself that you did nothing wrong to deserve that kind of treatment from anyone. Value and respect yourself so that others will do, too.

Always remember that no one will abuse you if you don’t allow them to abuse you.

Heart Cake © by FantasyClay

Don’t get depressed and loose your faith if you will have quadruple bypass like my father. Just read on… Over time and depending on the kind of lifestyle a person adapts, there is no guarantee that the blood vessels will remain healthy and unblocked for the rest of our lives. Somehow, like any other organ in our body, these arteries are likely to be damaged (for a lot of reasons and causes) or blocked thereby reducing the supply of blood and oxygen and other nutrients to their specific destinations.

A blocked artery or blood vessel will pose a serious health concern to the heart since these vessels carry the blood and oxygen needed by the heart to function well. If the blood flow to the heart is reduced due to the narrowing of the arteries it will result to coronary artery disease and the heart will be at great risk.

This problem can be addressed through a surgical procedure known as CABG or coronary artery bypass graft or more colloquially termed as ‘cabbage’. This is a surgical procedure involving the grafting of new arteries taken out from other healthy part of the body, attaching the new grafts to the diseased arteries to redirect the flow of blood to the heart. In other words, the new grafts are used to bypass a narrowed section of the coronary blood vessels.

Why Quadruple Bypass

Coronary artery bypass graft or CABG could be for any number of diseased or damaged or blocked blood vessels. A thorough and extensive workout is required by the surgeon to determine how many arteries need grafting or bypass. Once this is determined, the procedure will be termed after the number of damaged arteries.

Quadruple bypass surgery indicates there are four arteries to be grafted and bypassed. The surgeon will take out healthy blood vessels from the other part of the body, in most cases from the legs and graft them into the damaged heart arteries before and after the blocked sections. This allows blood to be literally redirected or rerouted around the disease blood vessels to the heart, allowing the heart to receive the blood and oxygen supply from said arteries. The new grafts will serve as the new coronary arteries whose main function is to deliver the blood and oxygen requirements / supply of the heart.

Common Surgical Risks

Before any surgical procedure is performed, a thorough discussion between the patient and the doctor is required. This would allow the doctor to explain to his patient, in more details the risks, expected outcomes, chances of recovery, what will happen during and after the surgery. The patient should have a clear picture and understanding of what the procedure generally and specifically entails for the patient.

The risks posed by surgery depends on a host of variables – age, health condition, severity of disease, type of operation and even the lifestyle of the patient.

Some common surgical risks are :

• Reaction to anesthesia – Patients react differently to anaesthesia. Some would pose problems during intubation or aspiration. Some manifest increased heart rate or high blood pressure. Malignant hyperthermia (when the patient’s temperature level is abnormally high) may happen in some patients and could be life-threatening.
• Bleeding – abnormal bleeding necessitating blood transfusion
• Infections – this is common to all surgical procedures and is dependent on the physical well-being of the patient
• Decline in memory – sometimes caused the anaesthesia, patients experience low memory and reduced cognitive ability, which will be regained or recovered within the year or less after the surgery
• Blood Clots – formation of blood clots which can cause stroke
• Delayed healing – depending on the over-all health condition of the patient, healing time may vary from person to person. Patients with other illnesses are likely to heal longer than those without
• Breathing difficulty – most patients experience this but for a short while only after the surgery. Those who have prolonged breathing problems are likely to suffer from pulmonary illness and chronic diseases. Smokers may also exhibit this problem after surgery
• Death – any surgery that requires stopping of the heart has this scary risk of death.

The surgical procedure alone will not guarantee that the problem will disappear forever. After surgery changes will be required to facilitate the healthy growth of the grafted arteries through lifestyle changes and good health practices. You can get more information at bypasssurgery.com.

Feeling scared or frightened is a natural reaction drawn out when faced with fear triggers like snake, spider, height, etc. Whatever the trigger is, the initial and normal reaction is that of feeling afraid. But fear can be abnormally disruptive. To some, fear lasts a short time. To others, it can be unusually long.

A friend of mine told me that when she was pregnant she used to have this weird episode when she would feel very scared walking alone at night even if there are a lot of other people around. She didn’t and could not understand what was happening to her at that time. She got edgy towards the end of the day when she’s done with her class (she’s a teacher) and home bound. She would constantly ask a co-teacher to walk with her from the school until she has gotten a cab. It was very difficult for her and the worst part is she did not know why.

When her fear became too disruptive for her that it limited her movement even in school, she was advised to seek professional help. The initial assessment was that something bad happened to her in the past (which she couldn’t remember) that triggers the onset of fear every time she’s set to go home. After a series of consultation and therapy, it was found out that when she was about 5 years old, she almost got lost when she and her father took a stroll in the nearby park. She apparently enjoyed walking around the park she completely walked one step too far off the park. And she could hardly remember her way back. Luckily, a neighbour spotted her walking aimlessly and took her home. She recovered from the traumatic experience and shock but her subconscious retained pieces of the incident which is triggered whenever she walks alone.

If my friend did not admit to herself that something is terribly wrong with her and did not consult with a professional she would have been kept in the dark not understanding why she feels that way. Her life would have been terribly affected and disrupted. Her psychologist was able to dig up the source of her fear and eventually got her to overcome it.

My friend shares below how she managed to overcome her fear with the help of her psychologist.

• Fear recognition : One must be able to determine if the fear is still within normal level or degree. If the fear consumes and eats you up in a way that disrupts your normal activities, it probably is something else. A deeper analysis will reveal a trigger.
• Once the trigger is identified, one should slowly condition the mind that feeling afraid is not doing you any good and that it has to stop. It will take time but in the end you should be able to face your fear (whatever it is)
• Learn some relaxing and calming exercises and activities. This will get your mind off the fear somehow. If you are feeling edgy, find a distraction and stay with it for a while.
• Try to focus on positive thoughts and memories. Don’t invite negativity as it will just hasten the onset of fear attacks
• Depending on what triggers the fear, find creative ways to release emotion. If you fear a person, get any picture and vandalize or deface it as a way to vent out your fear and that such fear cannot destroy you but it’s the other way around. It is you who will defeat fear.

There are of course other ways of overcoming fear. What is important is to take the first step and understand the fear and how it is affecting your life and have strong resolve to fight and overcome it. The process is long  and sometimes difficult but you know you are on your way to recovering from fear.

How many of us are afraid of heights? How many fear the ocean? Still how many among us feel trapped in an elevator even if there are only a few persons sharing the lift?

One time or another, we have experienced some kind of fear or phobia : of snakes, of a crowd or audience, of boarding an airplane, etc. We can not explain why we have such fear or what triggered that. All we know is that, the fear seems to consume us that we are rendered helpless when faced with these triggers.

PHOBIA

A medical definition of phobia states that is a kind of nervousness disorder but it is different than anxiety. A phobia is an unreasonable fear of something. It could be  an animal, a surrounding or certain environment setting, a situation or circumstance, etc. When fear is uncontrolled, extreme  and inexplicable, it is considered a phobia. If one experiences an inexorable anxiety which prevents him/her from functioning normally if faced with the fear triggers, one is considered phobic or suffering from phobia.

THREE CLASSIFICATION OF PHOBIA

Extreme fear or phobia is classified into three types  - SOCIAL ANXIETY DISORDER, SPECIFIC PHOBIA and AGORAPHOBIA.

• SOCIAL FEAR or PHOBIA is the fear of social humiliation or discomfiture. This happens when one faces a crowd, audience or other people and fear attacks on the thought of getting embarrassed or judged in front of them. When one displays extremely low self-confidence when faced with other people, phobia sets in at the  mere thought of embarrassment or humiliation. Speaking in front of an audience or crowd or even a small group of people is an activity next to impossible.
•  SPECIFIC FEAR or PHOBIA is the anxiety felt over animals (snakes, mice, spiders, dogs or specific situations or environment conditions such as fear of high places, flying, water, darkness, illness, etc. The object of their fear triggers the attack of panic and terror.
• FEAR OF PUBLIC OR OPEN SPACES is the terror felt when one goes out of a secure place or a comfort zone. One panics at the thought of being in an open area with a lot of people in it and having the great trouble of getting out. The most extreme translation of this phobia is choosing to just stay at home where it is the only place in the world considered safe and protected.

SYMPTOMS OF PHOBIA

Phobia may present itself in many different ways. People display it in various degrees which could be a simple uneasiness or mild nervous attack or an extreme anxiety attack or serious severe panic episode.

There are tell-tale signs or physical symptoms evident in phobic persons. They include:

• shortness of breath
• extremely fast heartbeat rate
• dizziness
• abnormal quavering or severe trembling
• agitation
• respiratory problems (breathing difficulty, tight chest)
• troubled tummy

Most people suffering from phobia attacks also experience inexplicable anxiety or panic feeling. Near passing out or fainting when fear attacks, having an overwhelming desire to flee or run away are also  common symptoms of a person with phobia.

TREATMENT OF PHOBIA

If a phobic person elicits severe distress manifestations to prevent him/her from a normal life, one should consult a medical professional on how to overcome one’s fear. As in any other disorder, treatment options are available according to the degree of phobia suffered by a person. If the fear is so intense and great that you are disabled to function normally, the phobia should be treated.

Therapists have developed therapy programs which can be done by the affected person.

Support group is always the first part of any phobia therapy program as this greatly helps the person to recognize the problem and agree to doing something about it.

A therapy would always include challenge to face the fear and triumphed over it. This will initially be difficult because a phobic person always avoids his source of fear. But constant assurance from the support group that nothing harmful or bad will happen even if one is faced with his/her fear will get the phobic person to take that chance of finally overcoming his/her fear.

Some therapists would also get the phobic person exposed or constantly faced with the phobia trigger. If the trigger is a snake, a phobic person would be seeing snakes a few times under a controlled setting just to have the feeling that the anxiety is baseless and that one should not be overwhelmed by the mere sight of these fear triggers. The phobic person’s degree of anxiety towards a fear trigger is reduced session after session.

Therapists also developed relaxation techniques to help calm down the nerves when fear attacks. There are breathing exercises which help eliminate the build-up of tension or terror. Teaching the phobic persons techniques on dealing with unpleasant  thoughts or negative  ideas are also helpful in overcoming phobia. Focusing on building-up one’s ability to cope and deal with the fear rather than avoiding these negative triggers, will very much help people suffering from phobia to get over their fear and liberate themselves from the stressful condition.

Depression is a mental state or condition of an individual manifesting an unhappy disposition. This may be caused by a whole lot of factors including but not limited to: anxiety, despair, helplessness, loss of a loved one, lack of self-esteem, etc. Anyone who is rendered disabled by an abnormally long period of sadness is likely to suffer from depression.

In order to determine whether a person is suffering from depression, one must be able to identify the symptoms or manifestations that go along with the disorder. Depression affects an individual’s temper, attitude and emotions. It is often manifested by extreme sadness, frustration and complete lack of concentration or focus. A depressed person may seem overly anxious, agitated or irritated, restless and even extraordinarily irritable. Persons who get overwhelmed with grief, life’s hardships are the likely candidates to having depression. Persons who display any of these symptoms for a prolonged period are most often than not,  diagnosed as depressed. The degree of depression may vary according to the manifestations and causes of such mental state.

CLINICAL DEPRESSION SYMPTOMS

Everyone goes through a certain phase of normal sadness. The depression may have sprung up from frustration at work, relationships, family, peers, etc. Feeling sad or unhappy is a phase that every normal person goes through and comes out of. However, if the sadness becomes overpowering or devastating and stays on for weeks or longer, then a medical/professional consultation is in order. Major depression is the most common type of clinical depression one suffers from, with the following warning signs to watch out for:

• trouble getting sleep (onset of insomnia or sleeping disorder)
• over-sleeping
• harboring pessimistic thoughts or emotions
• loss of appetite
• over-eating
• inability to concentrate or focus
• forgetfulness or not remembering how to do ordinary or usual things or activities
• excessive drinking of alcohol
• very low self-esteem or confidence
• feeling desperate and emotionally weak
• lack of control of emotions (anger, over-happiness, irritability, resistance, defiance, etc.)
• agitated looks
• suicidal tendency
• inability to cope with life’s stress and pressures

There are other types of clinical depression which will be discussed in another article.

OVERCOMING DEPRESSION

Having identified that a person is depressed or suffering from depression, what is the next step? What are the treatments available? Are there ways to prevent it (if not yet on advanced stage) or cure it (if it already progressed to advanced stage)?

In order to render the correct treatment for depression, it is important to evaluate and determine the causes of such depression, or what triggered this mental condition. It is wrong notion that depressed people are cured by just taking prescribed anti-depressant pills. A professional psychologist’s or psychiatrist’s evaluation and recommended treatment options may vary depending on the symptoms and behavior presented, causes of depression or depression triggers and the response of the depressed individual to the medications given.

When depression is recognized to be present in a person, the first step to take is to seek professional help and have an initial consultation with a psychologist or psychiatrist to determine the extent or degree of depression.  A series of behavioral therapy may then be recommended to further help assess the best and suitable treatment option. If therapy is not enough to address the problem, medication will be the next option. Medication allows a certain relief or break from depressive state but comes with side-effects. The correct medication should be determined in order to minimize the resulting drawbacks.

Other practical and simpler ways to combat depression include :

• Creating a support-system group – this is an avenue to express feelings, emotions,  thoughts. A group ready to support and show understanding on what a depressed person is going through without feeling being judged
• Changing way of life – altering routine activities with new and different activities
• Participate and join in activities which enhance one’s emotional stability and ability to cope with normal life’s trials or pressures
• Allow channels of communication – a repressed emotion kept for a long time inside the mind can translate later on to the onset of depression if there is no avenue for a person to channel his emotions, feelings, sentiments or thoughts.

In the end, whatever professionally-recommended treatment options are taken, it is very important for a depressed person to get the feeling of being loved, understood and accepted and not feel being judged for his condition.

Have you ever experienced thinking about a plane crash over and over you think it will never stop? Or have you thought about a specific incident and it got stuck in your head, you thought you’ll drown in it? And then you ask yourself, “Is this normal? Do other people experience the same thing?”

Well, there is no reason to panic just yet. Other people share similar experience. You are not the only person who seems to be suffering from having obsessive thoughts. It’s having that nagging feeling which is not easily withdrawn from your system.

Obsessive thoughts are thoughts, pictures or imagery repeatedly flashing in your mind at any given time. It could be anything. A female colleague used to tell stories about her thinking that she is being attacked by his neighbor. The thought was so wild that she got so scared she did not want to stay in her house anymore. She did not feel safe thinking that her neighbor is out to do something bad to her.

Having a feeling like this is very disturbing and sometimes disabling especially when you are not able to send signal to your brain to stop thinking about those horrible things. It can get really depressing and terribly upsetting. I wouldn’t want to experience what my colleague did for a prolonged period of time.

WAYS TO COPE WITH OBSESSIVE THOUGHTS

Medical reference materials describe obsessive thoughts as a manifestation of an obsessive compulsive disorder or OCD. Some refer to it as the “white bear syndrome”. Either way you call it, the effects are the same. The obsessive thoughts do not go away!

How then do you cope with this psychological disorder? How do you tell your brain to stop entertaining those recurring thoughts and focus on other thoughts? My female colleague shared some of the coping mechanisms recommended to her by her psychologist.

• Take on a good diet regimen. Eating more raw vegetables and fresh fruits help treating ‘chemical imbalance”. A good diet naturally helps the brain to function better.
• Learn relaxing exercises like quiet meditation, yoga, etc. which help release the tension you are feeling during an episode of obsessive thoughts. You can also keep yourself busy with things like home organization. Keeping your mind focused on other thoughts rids you of the anxiety, tension and nervousness building up in your head when the obsessive thoughts start to set in
• Stop forcing yourself to get rid of the thoughts. It only worsens the situation. It is recommended that you calmly take in the thoughts and slowly and gradually divert your attention to other things so you’ll take the focus away from the obsessive thoughts

These may not immediately solve the problem but they will definitely improve the situation. My female colleague still experiences episodes every now and then but the good thing is she has better control of her thoughts than before. She no longer panics when she gets these obsessive thoughts episodes.

Companies today need all of the help they can get to cut costs and gain a competitive advantage. By keeping a very close control of their stock levels it will help companies slash their inventory costs. Inventory management software will assist your company in cutting costs by tracking your inventory closely and setting complex pricing standards. These pricing standards can be based on certain customers, quantity and more. Some inventory management software has features that can be integrated with CRM, customer relationship management features. This can allow your partners, customers or sales representative to view real time inventory levels such as would be needed for a Web store.

Your logistics facilities need to be managed with functionality to obtain optimal inventory management processes. You have the option to record and track materials by either quantity or value. If you have a need for warehouse inventory management the functions will cover the movements within the internal warehouse and also storage.

Your customer service can be improved and costs cut for such things as warehousing and transportation. The order fulfillment and material handling will also be affected by using inventory management software. Some of the benefits of using inventory management software can include visibility, your ability to improve decision-making and improving your cash flow by cutting costs. Inventory turns will be monitored closely and you can make your flow of goods significantly improved.

You can utilize the inventory management software for warehouse management. By tracking the quantity and the value of all of your materials in inventory, performing a physical inventory and thus optimizing your resources at the warehouse. The employees will be able to plan, enter and document warehouse and internal movements of stock. This is possible by managing goods receipts, storage, physical stock transfers, goods issues and transfer postings.

By using the inventory management you can monitor workload planning in real time, radio frequency or bar-code scanning, order consolidation and wave picking, unit management and cross docking.

Most of the inventory control software available today is easy to use and teach to your employees. By implementing this process you will do much for your company’s ability to keep a tight control on your inventory and eliminate unnecessary inventory purchases. By knowing exactly what is in your inventory you will be able to plan future purchases to effectively have real time inventory for your just-in-time shipments. This software enables companies to reduce inventory errors and improves customer service in the process.

Inventory management software will control the assets that a company is producing for sale during the company’s operations. A good inventory management tool will take down total costs that are either direct or indirect that are involved with holding inventories. The importance of this management to the company will depend directly upon how much the company has invested in inventory.

In a manufacturing company the task of planning the inventory can be very complex and rests on fundamental principles. You will want the system that is used for inventory has to tie into the firm operations. The inventory management and the planning will have to be extremely responsive to the needs of the firm. The firm should design systems along with reports that will assist the company in making proper business decisions.

The activities within firms are contained in the inventory control systems and ensure the best possible way to deliver products to customers. Subsystems are within the inventory control and include sales, manufacturing, warehousing, ordering and receiving. The activities that are associated with each area may not be within separate subsystems but performing these functions must be done in order that the inventory control system runs well.

Both small and mid-sized businesses rely on a computerized inventory management systems in today’s business environment. It is true that some retail outlets and manufacturers as well as other businesses are still using manual means of inventory tracking. Some small businesses will not be able to justify the financial outlay of an electronics inventory tracking system. But there are other companies that are operating in industries that have a high volume turnover of either raw materials and/or finished products. For these companies, the computerized tracking systems have become a key component in the business strategy that will increase productivity and help them maintain an excellent competitiveness.

There have been some business experts that have said that inventory management can be the one element that could be the difference in today’s competitive business world for a businesses success or failure. Companies that utilize this technology are better equipped to succeed then their counterparts who rely on the outdated methods of inventory control.